Ivy Zelman thinks today's report is indicative of the sector as a whole. While Wall Street experiences record volatility swings, the housing market is in good shape. Zelman notes that inventories are at 30-year lows, while affordability is at record highs. She argues that people -- especially millennials — are thinking about buying homes again, which will continue to drive up demand and sales. So while the sector has been recovering since 2012, there is still a long way to go.

KB Home CEO Jeffrey Mezger tells ABC that housing markets are not fully "normalized," but there's nowhere to go but up.

"We're bullish in that the housing markets have a long way to go to get back to historical levels. As much as they've improved, there's still a lot of room to run. Between our backlog position and our communities that are open and the way we're performing, we're projecting continued improvement in revenue, margins, profit — all the metrics," he said.

Mezger added that affordability is "compelling" right now.

One market that undoubtedly agrees is Orange County. After years of destabilized housing shifts, one local publication said the market is back to normal.

The Orange County Register article, written by Jeff Collins, cites several exact examples and uses some great data to back up the claims:

The full-year median – or price at the midpoint of all 2015 sales – was $610,000, figures from Irvine housing data firm CoreLogic show. With sales totaling 36,588 homes, 2015 was the second-busiest year since the recession.

On the other hand, last year’s 4.8% price appreciation rate was the lowest since 2011.

When investors worried about a European debt crisis, a Greek debt crisis or China's stock market and economy, U.S. stocks dropped as people yanked their money out of the stock market and tucked it into U.S. Treasury bonds for safekeeping, he said. As the money flowed into bonds, the yields on them dropped, and mortgage rates did too.

One product expected to see greater action, according to this piece in CNN Money, is reverse mortgages.

New rules are providing extra protection and the stigma attached to the product is lessening, according to author Donna Rosato, writing for Time:

The stigma has lessened lately. Thanks in part to new rules for these government-backed loans, experts such as economics Nobelist Robert Merton have endorsed them, especially as a source of emergency funds. “There’s a totally different way of thinking about these now,” says John Salter, a professor of personal financial planning at Texas Tech University.

According to the piece by Adam Jeffery in CNBC, the American International Group is going down that path.

Yes, that AIG:

American International Group has decided to pursue a spin-off of its mortgage insurance business, according to people familiar with the matter, in a move that would come as the U.S. insurer fends off activist Carl Icahn.

The spin-off of that business however, which accounted for 7.4% of AIG's pre-tax operating income in the first nine months of 2015, is unlikely on its own to appease Icahn, who is calling for AIG to break up into three separate businesses.

Jacob Gaffney is the Editor-in-Chief of HousingWire and HousingWire.com. He previously covered securitization for Reuters and Source Media in London before returning to the United States in 2009. While in Europe for nearly a decade, he covered bank loans and the high yield market, in addition to commercial paper, student loan, auto and credit card space(s). At HousingWire, he began focusing his journalism on all aspects of the housing and mortgage markets.

This month inHousingWire magazine

Eight years after we began recognizing women for their influential work in the expanding housing and mortgage finance ecosystem, a traditionally male-dominated field, our Women of Influence list is bigger and better than ever! This year, we honor 85 women who are making lasting achievements in each sector of the housing economy. Read on to learn more about these accomplished women and the strides they are making in their industry segments.

Feature

The financial world at large is experimenting with changing its workforce culture in ways not fathomable 10 years ago. For example, in 2011, the dress code for female workers at UBS came to light with unflattering results. In it, the Swiss bank instructed female employees on not just how to dress and how to smell, but also preached the importance for ladies to apply lotion after taking showers. Fast forward to today and fellow Swiss bank, Credit Suisse has now created an official role to boost equal opportunities and create a fair treatment environment. Has the American mortgage industry made similar progress?

Commentary

The conversation around student loan debt and its economic impact on Millennials, those born from 1980 to 1998, has some questioning whether the future of the American Dream is in jeopardy. The nation’s student loan debt has soared to $1.4 trillion, surpassing credit cards in becoming the largest source of personal debt outside a mortgage.